The Alpha King And His Chosen Luna novel Chapter 188

Simply true

(Isla)

A few minutes later I heard footsteps behind us.

“Pardon the interruption,” Pryor said.

Caius and I turned.

“I’ve just heard from the healer,” he said. “Dara has been allowed to remain in her position. The censu has been placed on her record, but she’ll continue working there.”

I let out a slow breath.

“I’m glad,” I said.

Pryor nodded once.

“I thought you’d want to know.”

“I did.”

He inclined his head to both of us before walking away.

I looked at Caius.

“She has a chance now.”

“Yes,” he said.

“I hope she makes the most of it.”

I watched Pryor disappear back into the pack house before looking across the grounds again.

Had I done the right thing?

The question came quietly, without accusation. Brent had accepted the terms. Dara had accepted the censure. Neither outcome had been easy for either of them, but neither had been cruel, either.

I thought about everything that had led us here.

I hadn’t chosen revenge. I’d chosen consequences. There was a difference, even if it hadn’t always felt clear while I was making the decision.

I couldn’t say whether everyone would agree with the choices I’d made.

Some would probably think Brent had been given too much. Others might believe Dara deserved to lose everything she’d built. I understood both arguments, but neither of them sat right with me.

Justice had never meant making someone suffer simply because they’d caused suffering.

It meant drawing a line and refusing to let it be crossed again.

Simply true

Hooked at Caius beside me.

He hadn’t tried to influence my decisions. He’d trusted me to make them myself.

Standing here now, realized I was grateful for that trust almost as much as I was for the choices it had allowed me to make.

I let that thought settle.

This wasn’t about whether everyone agreed with me. It wasn’t even about whether Brent or Dara agreed with me. The only question that mattered was whether I could live with the choices I’d made.

I could.

That didn’t mean they had been easy. It didn’t mean they hadn’t hurt.

It just meant I hadn’t betrayed the person I wanted to become in order to make them.

“You’ve gone quiet again,” Caius said.

I looked up at him.

“I know.”

“What are you thinking about?”

I took a moment before answering.

“Whether I’ll ever stop questioning my decisions.”

He held my gaze.

“The people who never question them are usually the ones who should.”

I thought about that.

“So it doesn’t ever go away?”

“It becomes quieter,” he said. “You learn the difference between doubting yourself and making sure you’ve done the right thing.”

I let his words settle.

They didn’t erase every question I had.

They didn’t need to.

They were enough to remind me that caring about the choices I’d made wasn’t a weakness. It was part of making them honestly.

I reached for his hand without thinking.

He took mine the same way he always did, like it was the most natural thing in the world.

“I don’t want to become someone who stops caring,” I said.

Simply true

“You won’t.”

“You sound very certain.”

“I am.”

“How can you be?”

He smiled.

“Because I’ve watched the way you make every decision. You listen. You think. You care about who it affects. People like that don’t wake up one morning and stop caring.”

I looked at him for a long moment.

Somehow, hearing him believe it made it a little easier to believe it myself.

I smiled, though it was a small one.

“I hope you’re right.”

“I am.”

There wasn’t any hesitation in his voice. He believed every word as completely as he believed the sky would still be above us tomorrow. I wondered what it was like to have that kind of certainty about another

person.

Maybe that was one of the quiet gifts of being loved by someone like Caius.

He saw the parts of me I still questioned and believed in them anyway.

I squeezed his hand once.

We stood together without saying anything else, letting the silence settle around us until it felt like an

answer all on its own.

I took one last look across the grounds before drawing a slow breath.

Nothing had changed around me.

The same paths. The same buildings. The same woives going about their day.

The change had happened somewhere I couldn’t see.

It had happened inside me.

Γ

I hadn’t noticed it all at once. It had come one conversation, one choice, one act of kindness at a time until I could no longer remember what it felt like to believe I didn’t belong here.

I belonged.

That simple truth felt bigger than anything else.

I turned my head and looked at Caius.

He was watching the grounds now, one hand still holding mine as though he had no intention of letting go.

Simply true

Ismiled.

He noticed and looked back at me.

“What?” he asked.

“Nothing.”

His eyebrow lifted

“It doesn’t sound like nothing.”

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